Teamgroup T-Force Z54E PCIe 5 SSD Taps Phison For Blistering 14.9GB/s Storage Speed

Teamgroup is targeting gamers with its new T-Force Z54E, a solid state drive (SSD) that leverages Phison's E28 controller to push write and especially read speeds pretty close to the theoretical limit for NVMe storage on the PCI Express 5.0 bus. According to Teamgroup, its latest high-performance SSD can achieve speeds of up to 14,000MB/s (14GB/s) for sequential writes and 14.9GB/s (14,900MB/s) for sequential reads.

Based on the rated specs, the T-Force Z54E stands in the upper echelon of PCIe Gen5 x4 SSD storage options in the consumer market. M.2 form factor NVMe SSDs are hardwired to run on four PCIe lanes (x4), and the to put Teamgroup's rated specifications into perspective, the theoretical maximum throughput for a consumer PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD is around 15.75GB/s (15,750MB/s).

That doesn't take into account various overheads and other factors that prevent any consumer PCIe 5.0 SSD from actually hitting the bus spec's full speed potential. But as we've seen with each generation of drives, manufacturers are able to get fairly close as time goes on.

According to Teamgroup's product page, the T-Force Z54E employs high-density 218-layer 3D triple-layer cell (TLC) NAND flash memory. This is paired with Phison's E28 controller built on a 6-nanometer manufacturing process, which Phison touts as being the "world's first cutting-edge SSD controller chip with basic computational power specifically designed for GenAI model training and edge AI applications."

There's no mention of the drive being compatible with PlayStation 5 consoles, though it's certainly fast enough. Also, from the renders we've seen, it doesn't look like the included graphene heatsink would get in the way.

"The Z54E features Teamgroup's exclusive patented ultra-thin graphene heatsink. Users can pair the SSD with the motherboard's native heatsink or with Teamgroup's optional SSD liquid cooler or active cooling solutions to build an optimal thermal configuration. This ensures sustained stability under extreme speeds, delivering an unprecedented gaming experience," Teamgroup says.

Teamgroup's offering the T-Force Z54E SSD in 4TB, 2TB, and 1TB capacities. The aforementioned speed ratings apply to the 4TB and 2TB models. The 1TB model boasts the same 14.9GB/s read speed, and a slightly slower write speed at 13.7GB/s.

No word on price or availability, though as a point of reference, the Samsung 9100 Pro we reviewed in August offers similar speeds (slower writes and slightly slower reads) and can be found on sale for $126 for 1TB (37% off) and $397.99 for 4TB (28% off). The 2TB model is not on sale but currently goes for $198.99 on Amazon.